1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to an arrangement for and a method of providing information to users in a venue, the information being relevant to the physical location of a respective user in the venue and, more particularly to expediting commercial transactions based on a customer's proximity to the transactions, by recommending products, services, and the suppliers of such products and services, as well as providing useful information relating to such products, services and suppliers, thereby expediting the offering for sale, sale and processing of the products and services.
2. Description of the Related Art
The prior art has proposed various ways of expediting the processing of commercial products offered for sale to potential customers. These include the labeling of products with indicia such as bar code symbols which are electro-optically read by portable, hand-held readers of the type generally disclosed, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 4,251,798; No. 4,360,798; No. 4,369,361; No. 4,387,297; No. 4,593,186; No. 4,496,831; No. 4,409,470; No. 4,460,120; No. 4,607,156; No. 4,673,805; No. 4,736,095; No. 4,758,717; No. 4,760,248; No. 4,806,742; No. 4,808,804; No. 4,825,057; No. 4,816,661; No. 4,816,660; No. 4,845,350; No. 4,835,374; and No. 4,871,904; all of these patents having been assigned to the same assignee as the instant application, and being hereby incorporated herein by reference.
The reading of the symbols identify the products bearing the symbols. This information can be used to retrieve price information from a database, or to control inventory.